Are Ernie Ball strings this bad?

[RandalPinkFloyd]

I gave up on EB slinkies about 10 years ago. Die way too fast for in my experience. I haven't tried the EB Cobalt but my disdain for their slinkies has me hesitant to ever try the cobalt.

 

[Riff Ranger]

Back in the day I used EB nickel strings. IME they sound good for a few days then die a quick death. A lot of that is my body chemistry which produces oils that will kill strings quick. You said yourself those strings had been laying around for a while too so they probably have dust and other stuff on them. You should try cleaning them with denatured alcohol or boiling them in water. That should give them some more life but nickel strings typically don't keep the zing very long. I recommend D'addario Pro Steels. They last longer than nickel, have a higher output and are smoother than Rotosounds.

“Back in the day” may be a key phrase here. Rotosounds (and D’Addarios, while we’re dinging everybody) went dead on me almost instantly … more than 20 years ago. Most strings didn’t last long for me back then, other than the gold ones I had for a year.

Not even a month ago, fans of Rotosound on here had said they used to lose their zip and zing or whatever pretty quickly, and that that’s not often the case anymore. I tried several brands when I got on here myself three years ago, and most of them seem much longer lived than I remember. Maybe they’ve improved almost across the board; maybe I do a better job of stringing and maintaining my instruments than I did as a teenager; I suspect it’s a combination of both, but primarily the former.

It sounds like our OP got a slightly bum set. It does happen. I don’t think two strings that only sound “fabulous” for a week make an entire brand “[that] bad.”

 

[Lenny JG]

Ernie ball sucks

 

[TOOL460002]

IME new Slinkies have worse harmonics than old DR's. Aside from other issues, that tells me enough. Sorry for your experience.

 

[micguy]

“Back in the day” may be a key phrase here. Rotosounds (and D’Addarios, while we’re dinging everybody) went dead on me almost instantly … more than 20 years ago. Most strings didn’t last long for me back then, other than the gold ones I had for a year.

Years ago, most of us played on stages with incandescent lights - it was hot, we sweated up a storm. Our strings were dripping in sweat. Now we play on stages with LED lights. It's not hot, we don't sweat much, if at all.

Strings absolutely died quickly years ago. Now they don't. But I don't think the strings have changed.

 

[PeaveyPlayer]

My cobalt seriously last long

but our door gigs once made them rust on me …


But seriously
There’s no other string I use on a few basss

 

[Riff Ranger]

Years ago, most of us played on stages with incandescent lights - it was hot, we sweated up a storm. Our strings were dripping in sweat. Now we play on stages with LED lights. It's not hot, we don't sweat much, if at all.

Strings absolutely died quickly years ago. Now they don't. But I don't think the strings have changed.

… and I moved from the humid Great Lakes to the more arid West. Hmm.

 

[Deleted member 365158]

I like regular slinkies 50-105 and how they sound after a week of playing.
I also like a lot of other bass related items that others here don’t.

 

[SC Bassboy]

“Back in the day” may be a key phrase here. Rotosounds (and D’Addarios, while we’re dinging everybody) went dead on me almost instantly … more than 20 years ago. Most strings didn’t last long for me back then, other than the gold ones I had for a year.

Not even a month ago, fans of Rotosound on here had said they used to lose their zip and zing or whatever pretty quickly, and that that’s not often the case anymore. I tried several brands when I got on here myself three years ago, and most of them seem much longer lived than I remember. Maybe they’ve improved almost across the board; maybe I do a better job of stringing and maintaining my instruments than I did as a teenager; I suspect it’s a combination of both, but primarily the former.

It sounds like our OP got a slightly bum set. It does happen. I don’t think two strings that only sound “fabulous” for a week make an entire brand “[that] bad.”

Fair enough. I will say that Pro Steels did not exist 20 years ago. They came out around 2004 but there must have been improvements in string manufacturing since then. Regardless the most life I ever get out of strings is about 2 weeks then it's time to clean them. Back when I was touring I kept several sets of strings with me and would clean them during the week in-between shows. It was not unusual for me to swap strings after every performance.

 

[Yellow Bang66]

I used to use EB nickels in my guitar days because they were cheap. I never got more than 50hrs of playing on them before they had about as much zing as a slab of tofu.

I’ve no experience with Panga, but if you spent any time chasing zing which had long since departed, you may have been digging way harder into the strings than you normally would?

I waited & waited for them to release their Cobalts after they announced, ordered some slinkys in the meantime, I was not impressed! gave them away after a week! Ifinally recieved the cobalts & hated then instantly! nothing special at all & very very tight! a lot of Tension removed them ASAp for fear of warping the neck because of the high tension! Never thought much of their products. I'd return'em or replace fast! maybe call their CS. I'd hate it if strings were causing damage to my fretboard!

 

[tekhedd]

Well, the cobalt flats are pretty awesome, and hold their zing for quite some time. (Now called slinkies for some reason even though they're really not very slinky, and sadly not available in medium in 5-string sets).

The nickels...they don't last, this goes double for their guitar strings. I *use* slinky mediums but they go dead pretty quickly. I mean, nothing like how fast Fender nickels go dead, but they do sound great for that first day. Seems to me there's a correlation between that "great nickel string sound" and going dead fast.

Yeah, the cobalts last, the nickels not so much. #shrug

 

[lowfreqgeek]

Not my experience.

The most duds I've encountered in 30+ years were Dunlop and DR.

 

[MYLOWFREQ]

I've been using the orange Ernie Ball Hybrid Slinkies since the late 90's, and IME they are overall great strings that you can buy wherever you travel in the world, and they are cheap.

I used to use the D'addario, but I got way many more lemons and IME the EB lasts longer.

Rotosound and DR make great roundwound nickel strings as well, but they are not readily available everywhere.

 

[logdrum]

For guitar and I think for bass, they do make a good balanced set, but they do die quicker. I still use them for guitars. They do not like moisture so they are my winter/dry season strings. Some people have bad reaction to the Cobalt strings. I only use the Ernie Ball Cobalts bass string. I have them on 2 basses.

 

[Jek Porkins]

I use the Hybrid Slinkies. Love em!

 

[SunByrne]

Hmm, I have Slinkys on my short scale Ray, and they seem fine. I'm sure my Ray34 came with them, too, and they were fine but I prefer the D'Addario balanced tension set, so that's what's on that bass.

Who else makes short scale strings? I guess it doesn't matter, I could just cut down regular length strings, just seems like a waste...

 

[sethlow3]

Well, all I can say is that in all my years of using rotosounds, I never once encountered a defective string.

I have…twice actually and I really didn’t want to.

 

[Mechayoshi]

They are fine for me, at least the extra slinky find. They do break in quick but don’t go dead for me. Others are better but EB is good enough and cheap.

 

[Lenny JG]

I've been using the orange Ernie Ball Hybrid Slinkies since the late 90's, and IME they are overall great strings that you can buy wherever you travel in the world, and they are cheap.

I used to use the D'addario, but I got way many more lemons and IME the EB lasts longer.

Rotosound and DR make great roundwound nickel strings as well, but they are not readily available everywhere.

D'addario and Ernie ball are the worse string companies I've come across for sure

 

[Cave Puppy]

Same. I burned through 2 sets of the short scales in about a month of playing 2-3 times per week.

 

[Hounddog409]

I had a set of 45-65-80-100 EB round wounds that was laying around, I think they came gratis with something else, and put them on my Ibanez SRF700. At first I'm getting a fabulous growl from the E and A strings, but within a week the low E sounds like it is muted, even when played open.

Also they are scratching the (panga panga) fingerboard pretty badly, but it is just looks at this point. I never used to worry about this as it did not affect the sound at all, but the scratching from just a few weeks of playing is worse than 10 years of playing on my Peavey T20/rosewood fretless with rotosounds. I thought Panga Panga was supposed to be very hard ... this has nothing to do with the "muted" sound of the new strings BTW I'm just mentioning it.

EB slinkies are all I use on all my basses.

No issues.